Martin Clunes’ popular ITV drama Doc Martin will finish its run with the ninth series next year, RadioTimes.com can reveal.

This year will see ITV air series 8 of the Martin Clunes drama in which he plays the uptight but brilliant GP who has been relocated to the fictional Cornish village of Portwenn.

But despite rumours that this would be the final series, the show will in fact conclude in 2018 with series 9. Both shows are likely to air in the autumn of their respective years.

Clunes himself, whose wife Philippa Braithwaite runs the production company Buffalo Pictures that makes the show, assures RadioTimes.com that there will be a series 8 this year and a series 9 next year. And then that really WILL be it.

Tuesday, 18 April 2017

IT ISN’T every day that someone local in the community is put under the spotlight to be in a popular television drama, but that is the life of Bude man, Paul Martin, who is Doc Martin’s body double.

Paul Martin, from Martin Group Services in Bude, is in his spare time the body double of Doc Martin, the famously grumpy doctor from the picturesque seaside village of Port Isaac.

Having appeared in various Rosamunde Pilcher films for German television, as well as briefly playing a security guard, alongside Sheila Hancock, in a scene from Delicious, which aired just after Christmas, Paul has been involved in the ever popular Doc Martin TV series since it first aired in 2004, being an extra and supporting artist.

However, in 2013, he was offered the chance to be Doc Martin’s body double for various scenes, and has continued in this role ever since.

Paul told the Post: “I think I just happened to be in the right place at the right time, really. We were filming scenes of Martin and Louisa’s wedding reception, when one of the crew approached me asking whether I would be available to be Mr Clunes’ body double in the back of the wedding car.

“They picked me out as I was of similar build and height, as well as having a hairline and colour very similar to that of the man himself. Obviously I said ‘yes’ and I have been doing it on and off ever since!”